


The Mourning After

by aluminum_heart



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Animal Death, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Post Hogwarts AU
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-10-25
Updated: 2017-10-25
Packaged: 2019-01-22 20:17:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,000
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12490004
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aluminum_heart/pseuds/aluminum_heart
Summary: Crookshanks may be a magical cat, but that doesn't make him any more immortal than his nine lives already grant him.  Hermione knows this, but knowing something is approaching and being able to handle it when it happens, are two very, very different things.  (Set a few years after the Second Battle of Hogwarts, but not too close to "Nineteen Years Later".)





	The Mourning After

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this in part to cope with the loss of my own furry best friend earlier this month.

“That’s the last one for tonight,” Hermione decides aloud as she finishes one last comment with a flourish. She drops the scroll on top of a stack of similarly edited parchments, places her quill on her desk, and briefly rests her head on her arms. Hermione has been working longer hours lately, her thoughts preoccupied with upcoming exams and preparing her students for their OWLs and NEWTs. She has been grading essays long into the night, only allowing herself to stop hours after the moon has risen and only when her eyes and back scream for respite. 

Opening her eyes, she stands up from her desk and stretches slowly, feeling and hearing the pop and crack of what seems to be every joint on her body release tension from sitting in such a hunched position for so long. Gathering up her things, Hermione reflects on the days when she was the student, rather than the professor. History of Magic wasn’t something she pictured herself teaching, especially when she thinks of her predecessor’s teaching method, droning on and on, and either being unable to see, or blatantly overlooking, his students’ boredom and snoring. No, Binns was never an captivating professor, but Hermione likes to think she teaches History of Magic in a more interesting, and hopefully more effective, way. 

At least none of her students have fallen asleep in class, she thinks dryly, before adding a reluctant but realistic “yet” to that statement. Exams are approaching, and she remembers all too well the exhaustion that always came with them, as students stayed up late and got up early, desperately stuffing their overtired brains with every bit of knowledge they found that might be helpful to them. Someone is sure to use her class as a nap period in the upcoming weeks to regain what strength they could before plunging back into the fervor. She would bet a Galleon on it.

Casting one last glance around to make sure she has everything she wants to take with her, she leaves the classroom and walks down the corridor to her sleeping quarters. She opens the door and quietly calls, “I’m home!” A welcoming trill greets her, and she grins as Crookshanks hops over to say hello. Putting her bag down on an armchair near the door, she picks him up gently and pets his soft thick fur, telling him about her day. His squashed orange face rubs lovingly against her cheek, his whiskers tickling her nose and ear while his deep purrs reverberate throughout his body. She’s careful to mind his right front leg, which he has been favoring the past few months, and which he now holds carefully straight out, as if folding it in would be too much of an effort. 

Hermione doesn’t remember when she first noticed Crookshanks limping on three paws rather than taking his usual haughty strides earlier this year. At first she’d dismissed it, thinking to herself that perhaps he’d injured his paw jumping from the top of her wardrobe to the ground. He didn’t seem to be particularly bothered, and it would heal itself in time. However, as the weeks turned to months, he continued hopping around, holding his paw slightly above the ground when he was sitting, and even maneuvering himself into positions where he laid on his other side, gingerly placing his paw on the floor or cushion so as to keep even the slightest weight off of it. Then a coin seemed to flip, and he started using his leg again, but still without bending his paw. As if the leg were a wooden stump or crutch, he was soon able to limp around faster than before, though he still took great care not to put any pressure on his paw when getting up or lying down. 

Now, as she strokes him, Hermione asks herself yet again whether she should attempt to do anything to heal him. She knows that he is an old cat, having bought him from the menagerie twelve years earlier, and him already being at least five years old according to the people there. And he does seem to be pain-free, apart from the non-use of the leg. He’s the same loving, dear cat he’s always been. She kisses his head gently and sets him on the ground, intent on fixing supper for the both of them. He takes one step to follow her, wobbles, and falls forward, lying awkwardly on the ground with his rump in the air, as if this was an intended action on his part. 

Frowning slightly, Hermione scoops him up into her arms again and looks into his eyes. “I’ll just have to carry you with me,” she remarks to him, and Crookshanks blinks back at her, still purring. 

After dinner, they curl up together on a chair, Hermione propping up the cat with a blanket so she can shift around without worrying about him toppling over suddenly. She turns the page of the book she is reading, then catches Crookshanks staring at her out of the corner of her eye. She pats his side gently and is rewarded with a quiet mew, much more reserved than his usual wails. “What am I going to do with you, you silly cat?” she asks him, and he mews again, this time without making a sound at all. 

She gets up from her seat, goes over to her bed, and arranges a few extra blankets and pillows into a makeshift cushion for the cat to lay on. Usually he sleeps on her bed, either under the covers or at the foot, but she doesn’t want him falling off during the night, so she picks him up from the chair and lays him gently on his side on the cushion. As she settles into bed, Hermione checks on him one last time and is surprised to see he’s turned himself around to stare up at her. She smiles at him, whispers, “Goodnight,” and turns out the light.


End file.
